Silly me, I thought SXSW was a film and music festival. I went there to talk about DV Rebel filmmaking, but I didn't meet more than a handful of traditional filmmakers. I did, however, meet the internet.
I loves me my podcasts, so it was way cool to meet folks like Veronica Belmont and Joanne Colan, Kent Nichols of Ask a Ninja and Erik Beck of Indie Mogul. I gave a shout out to my Montreal homies Rudy Jahchan and Casey McKinnon of Galacticast who have been putting The Guide to great use on their show, on and off camera. And it is always good to chill with Alex Lindsay of This Week in Everything.
I did feel a bit out of place though (Stu to Joanne Colan over ice cream: "So, what do you do?"). But web celebs are mellow and seem to have a bemused respect for traditional media, if only for its reliance on this strange thing called "money." They welcomed me into their weird world with Twitter and free booze (one is often used to locate the other).
Scott Kirsner, the most excellent moderator of the panel, posted notes on his blog. I too got great feedback from attendees and want to thank all who overcame hangovers and daylight savings time to be there. Now it's back to reality for me, and back to my iPhone podcasting tab for all my new friends.